This study investigated the language input of eight childcare providers to eight young children with developmental disabilities and language delay in day care contexts. Findings indicated that language input addressed to these children was directive and not finely tuned to their expressive language levels. Also, these children interacted…

Examined preschoolers' ability to map novel adjectives to object properties in two experiments. Found that 4-year-olds could extend novel adjectives from target to matching test object whether objects were drawn from same, or different, basic level categories. If 3-year-olds' first extended a novel adjective to objects in the same basic level…

This study examined effects of Enhanced Milieu Teaching on the social communications skills of four preschool children with autism when delivered by trained interventionists. Observational data indicated that all children showed positive increases for specific target language use at the end of 24 intervention sessions, and these results were…

A microethnographic study examined the language functions and cultural traits of Mexican American children during sociodramatic play in a bilingual preschool classroom. Findings showed that children learn how to use social language by having the opportunity to practice it freely but with guidance. Suggestions were devised for evaluating children's…

A study examined the extent to which linguistic variation in the English language might have been affecting the performance of 160 rural preschoolers in South Carolina. When dialectal variations were not considered, the performance of the children differed from that of the normative populations on tests that assessed grammatical morphemes.…

Behaviors of eight children (ages 2-5) with profound congenital deafness were analyzed using six classes of egocentric language: motor reaction activity, silent lips articulation, murmur, oral-facial mimics, body expression, and vocalization. Events in which children engaged in "dialogue" with themselves or a toy, while pursing a specific…

The knowledge of letter names measured just before children enter school has been known for a long time as one of the best longitudinal predictors of learning to read in an alphabetic writing system. After a period during which the comprehensive investigation of this relationship was largely disregarded, there is now a growing interest in attempts…

This paper investigates the concept of adjustment to school for a group of primary one (first grade) pupils in Singapore. Pupils rated by their teachers as being well adjusted obtained significantly higher grades at the end of the school year, did not require additional learning support, and exhibited better social skills compared to children…

This study examined the presence of specific story elements and story cohesiveness in child narratives. A sample of 35 Hawaiian children who attended a preschool that emphasized early literacy activities was compared with a control sample. Children first constructed a story from a set of five pictures with adult support, and then retold the story…

This study compared preverbal children (ages 3-4) with severe language impairments who were difficult to engage (Group 1) with others who were readily engaged (Group 2). The study focused on transitional episodes of engagement and on frequency of clinician and child verbal communications and nonverbal acts within transitional episodes. Eight…

In this case study, the language and cognitive development of a 4-year 5-month old profoundly deaf girl and her normally hearing identical twin sister were investigated by videotaping the twins in their home interacting with each other, the investigator, and family members. Materials used with the children were designed to elicit spontaneous,…

The study contrasted the learning of the Rebus and Bliss symbol systems by language-delayed preschoolers. Subjects included 26 black preschool children, aged 4-6. Results showed that Rebus pre-test and post-test scores were significantly higher than Bliss pre-test and post-test scores. Results also showed a 35% improvement in identification of…

Preliminary evidence indicates that children begin to generalize knowledge in a new way at approximately 3 years of age. Forty children between 1.5 and 3.5 years of age were given two tasks of graded complexity. The first and simpler task used four nonoverlapping classes, each composed of four identical objects. Two of the classes were tagged with…

The study was designed to measure language, cognitive, perceptual, and oral-motor abilities in 17 preschoolers referred for speech-language evaluation because of unintelligible speech. Ss were administered a test battery which included tests of hearing, coarticulation, vocabulary, speech sound discrimination, and oral examination of the speech…

This book concerns the growth of a single child, as reported by her mother, from her first encounters with books and print to the beginnings of independent reading and writing. The study took place mainly between the child's third and fourth birthdays, during which period weekly tape recordings were made of story-reading sessions with one or both…